Guillermo Lagarda

Papers

Total Citations

218

H-Index

About

Guillermo Lagarda’s research confronts one of the most urgent economic questions of our time: what happens to human prosperity when smart machines replace human labor? His work dissects the dual nature of automation—as both a driver of abundance and a source of profound dislocation. In his highly cited paper “Robots Are Us: Some Economics of Human Replacement” (121 citations), Lagarda models a stark future where intelligent machines could render human workers obsolete, much like the internal combustion engine did to horses, creating a paradox where rising output coexists with falling demand for labor. His follow-up, “Robots: Curse or Blessing? A Basic Framework” (97 citations), systematically weighs automation’s benefits—more goods and services—against its costs: job elimination, depressed wages, and the immiseration of displaced workers. Lagarda’s key contribution lies in formalizing these trade-offs, showing that under certain conditions, automation can actually reduce overall economic well-being. By framing the robot revolution as a fundamental challenge to inclusive growth, his work has become essential reading for economists and policymakers grappling with the future of work.